By whom this character was prepared we are not informed. It is not the {187} genuine Irish, but a hybrid fount, consisting chiefly of Roman and Italic letters, to which the “discrepants,” or seven distinctively Irish sorts, are added.[344] It is accompanied by a small and equally neat letter for notes, which, however, appears to be Saxon. The earliest specimen of this fount appears in a broadside _Poem on the Last Judgment_,[345] printed in 1571, and sent over to the Archbishop of Canterbury, apparently as a specimen of the type. This was followed almost immediately by the _Church Catechism and Articles_, translated by O’Kearney and Nicholas Walsh, afterwards Bishop of Ossery, and printed in 1571 at the cost of John Ussher.[346] The object of the royal donor was further realised in 1602, when there appeared from the press of John Francke, William O’Donnell’s (or Daniel’s) Irish _New Testament_,[347] the first version of that or any portion of the Holy Scriptures in the native character. In dedicating the translation to James I, Daniel thus refers to the royal origin of the types:—“And notwithstanding that our late dreade Soveraigne Elzabeth . . . provided the Irish characters and other instrumentes for the presse in the hope that God in mercy would raise up some to translate the Newe Testament into their native tongue, yet hath Sathan hitherto prevailed, and still they remain _Lo-ruchama Lo-ammi_, etc.” The type did further service in 1608, when Daniel’s _Common Prayer_[348] was printed by Francke, a well-executed work, with engraved title and beautiful {188} ornamented initials, each page being enclosed in a rule border. After the appearance of this book nearly a quarter of a century elapsed before the type reappeared in Bishop Bedell’s _A B C_, or English and Irish _Catechism_, printed by the Stationers’ Company at Dublin in 1631.[349] This _Catechism_, with additional matter, was republished by Godfrey Daniel in 1652, also in Dublin,[350] after which the Irish type of Queen Elizabeth disappeared in Ireland, and reappeared only in occasional words occurring in Sir James Ware’s books, printed in London by Tyler, in 1656 and 1658. There seems no reason for believing, as some state, that it was secured by the Jesuits and taken abroad.[351] Not only is it not to be found in any Irish work printed abroad, but the Irish Seminary at Louvain possessed a fount of its own, which, between 1616 and 1663, was in constant use.